


incepto ne desistam

by artfulacrostic



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, Canonical Child Abuse, Character Study, Child Soldiers, Gen, Implied Mind Rape, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Major Character Death tag is for the rest of Finn's fire-team, POV Antagonist, POV Outsider, Stormtrooper Culture, aka reconditioning, everything bad about being a stormtrooper treated nonchalantly, stormtroopers - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-30
Updated: 2019-12-30
Packaged: 2021-02-24 21:53:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22025032
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/artfulacrostic/pseuds/artfulacrostic
Summary: May I not shrink from my purpose.//To live is to fight. FN-2199—Nines, he calls himself—knows this. Every stormtrooper does. Not to fight is to die or run, and to die or run is to betray the First Order. To betray the First Order is to be a traitor. To be a traitor is to be worse than nothing.Or, FN-2187 through the years, and through Nines' eyes.
Relationships: FN-2199 | Nines & FN-2000 | Zeroes, Poe Dameron & Finn & Rey
Comments: 3
Kudos: 36





	incepto ne desistam

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so this has been almost four years in the making. I started writing it forever ago and I've gone back to it again and again to edit and add and edit and add. And now, in the wake of the finale of the Skywalker Saga, however you felt about it, it feels like I finally know enough about Finn and his story in canon to finish writing Nines's tale, which is really mostly the story of how Finn was never really FN-2187 in the first place. 
> 
> Large bits of inspiration have been drawn from Before the Awakening, including some character inspiration/description and one or two small scenes of dialogue that I considered especially important. Additionally, I did think that Zeroes is supposed to be Asian-analogous, a la Rose Tico (who deserved much better imho) so that was how I envisioned him while writing, whether it is apparent or not. 
> 
> One important note is that while Nines is in some ways (in my interpretation) a sympathetic character, he does not fight for the light, and while without the First Order's brainwashing, he probably would have been a very different person, that does not excuse his actions or behaviors. This is written in his perspective, of course, and he has many opinions which I do not share. That being said, I hope you enjoy trying to look at Finn and the rest of the stormtroopers through Nines's perspective!

Nines is ten years old when he first notices FN-2187. They are in the same year, like all the other FN-2000 designations, but of course are in different cadres of cadets. FN-2187 bunks with the other 180s, and Nines, whose proper designation is FN-2199, bunks with the 190s.

FN-2187 is unremarkable. He is uniform, and orderly, and unremarkable. His back is always straight and his salute is always crisp—but all the cadets have good posture and sharp salutes. Nines has never looked across the corridor when they line up outside their bunks, and noticed FN-2187.

This is as it should be. They are First Order cadets. Cadets become stormtroopers, and stormtroopers are identical tools; scalpels wielded with precision in the hands of the First Order.

At the time, Nines doesn’t even think of himself as “Nines” at all, just as his designation. This is as it should be, too. _FN-2199_ is his identity, and so it will remain, for the time being. Wearing the child-sized white armor that fits him like a glove, he is wholly identical to every other cadet in his year, as each is wholly identical to him.

(Beneath the armor, Nines has lots of brown freckles, and red hair that refuses to comb flat, and acid blue eyes that startle even him when he looks in the mirror.

Beneath the armor, he is not identical to anyone else.)

Everyone is identical. Undiscernible. Unchanging.

Until one day, when the FN-2180s are late coming back from the mess hall.

The supervising officer for Nines’s block forces all the bunks in their corridor to stand at attention in their lines. They wait, nervous faces hidden under blank helmets, for the FN-2180s to arrive.

For six tense minutes the whole corridor remains at attention, fighting their nerves and wondering what could possibly be happening.

Finally— _finally,_ Nines thinks, full of both dread and relief—the 180s file in, their faces hidden and their line subdued; apparently impassive.

One of the cadets has a mark on his helmet that instantly makes him stick out. The red lines draw the eye’s attention, which is exactly what no cadet ever wants. It looks like someone stuck their glove in a bowl of that disgusting red protein shake no one likes, and then deliberately tried to splash it over the trooper’s shining, polished helmet.

Nines counts down the row of the FN-2180s. _1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6_ —The offending cadet is designation FN-2187.

Their supervising officer, Major Distan, silently stalks down the corridor, between the pristine rows of polished white helmets. He has gray hair and gray skin which matches his uniform, and dead, crawling eyes.

Nines thinks sometimes that Major Distan looks like a walking corpse.

(He shouldn’t be thinking things like that about his superiors. No one knows, but he thinks it quietly, all the same.)

Major Distan and his awful glare slowly halt in front of FN-2187, who is motionless, as if he isn’t facing punishment that will make him ache for a month. He might even disappear, like Nines’s fellow cadet FN-2193 had.

FN-2187 does not appear to be trembling, like FN-2193 did. He does not look as if he is going to collapse and beg for a second chance, like she had.

Nines feels a hint of admiration. FN-2187 is brave. FN-2193 was not.

“Cadet,” Major Distan says calmly, almost cordially. His eyes glint, uglier than usual in the harsh corridor light. “Remove your helmet.”

An almost imperceptible shiver travels up and down the corridor. Every cadet, Nines included, is sure now that FN-2187 is going the way of FN-2193, and FN-2159 before her, and FN-2163 before him.

FN-2187, to his continuing credit, unlatches and removes his helmet without hesitation. His dark skin shines in the bleak white glow of the corridor lights. He is just barely sweating. Face blank and serious, as any good cadet’s should be. His deep brown eyes contain none of the panic Nines is sure he must feel.

To be ordered to remove your helmet—your symbol not only of anonymity, but of unity, of togetherness, of strength in numbers, and of everything that the cadets work for—is the ultimate humility. Some bear it well, like FN-2187, and some do not.

Nines has seen others who did not.

“Cadet, present your helmet,” the major continues blithely, as though he is not about to doom FN-2187 to a beating, or to reconditioning, or decommissioning.

FN-2187 does so promptly. Major Distan takes it. He looks it over, assessing the red streaks from whoever marked it with protein shake.

His eyes narrow just a little more. “What is your designation, Cadet?”

“FN-2187, sir.”

“Yes,” the major says.

No one dares to move a muscle. What does that non-committal answer mean? There’s no way to be sure.

“ _Yes._ FN-2187,” Major Distan says, rolling the numbers around on his tongue like he can taste them. “FN-2187, you are an exemplary cadet.”

FN-2187’s eyes finally show a hint of confusion, but he responds correctly. “Thank you, sir.”

“FN-2187,” the major announces, turning to stalk down the corridor in the other direction, the marred helmet gripped in his two hands like a trophy, “is an _exemplary_ cadet.”

The cadets do not respond. They know it is not required.

“FN-2187,” the major tells them, the gray skin of his face rippling as he speaks, “is one of the highest-ranking cadets ever trained in this facility. He has probably outscored each and every one of you at times. FN-2187 will be a stormtrooper. One of the best stormtroopers. Nearly a perfect stormtrooper. You should each strive to emulate FN-2187 in his training.”

Nines’s pity has given way to a shocked jealousy which he is frantically trying to suppress. Nines never knew that FN-2187 was so good. He _must_ be good, for the major to say these things about him. No one ever receives such compliments.

Major Distan pivots sharply, his flat eyes gleaming, and moves back down the corridor. He holds the helmet in just one hand, now, brandishing it, with his other fist tucked behind his back. “The First Order encourages competition of skill among cadets. The First Order _encourages_ cadets to strive to become ideal stormtroopers. But the First Order encourages, above all, the seamless unity that marks each and every one of you as a part of a cause greater than any one of us.”

He halts, back in front of FN-2187’s dark, blank face. Nines has a perfect line of sight to where the black-gloved fist behind his back clenches, his knuckles tightening and untightening. “The First Order does _not_ encourage cadets to punish those who should be emulated. And the First Order certainly does not encourage the dissolution of unity through any means.”

He fixes each of the 180s in place with the force of his gaze. “I will inquire only once, and if I do not receive an answer, then every member of your cadre, barring FN-2187, will be escorted immediately to reconditioning. Who left these marks on FN-2187’s helmet?”

Major Distan holds the helmet aloft, his hand supporting it from inside. Every eye is fixated on the red hand-mark, beginning to drip down the helmet.

No one steps forward for almost two full seconds, and then…

“Sir,” FN-2188 says, as she steps forward exactly one pace. “It was FN-2180, FN-2181, FN-2184, and FN-2186.”

All fifty-odd cadets in the corridor hold their breath in alarm, because they all know from experience not to make a sound. The four conspirators should have given themselves up to let their cadre continue functioning at optimum efficiency. Nonetheless, for 2188 to step forward, when she hadn’t taken part? An unforgivable betrayal. 

_Traitor,_ Nines labels her.

“I see,” Major Distan remarks. “And the remainder of your cadre, including yourself, FN-2182, FN-2183, FN-2185, and FN-2189, did nothing to prevent this from occurring.”

FN-2188 realizes she has made a mistake. “No. No, sir. FN-2187 is….”

Nines realizes she wants to say _different_. That is the only reason that they would have tried to humiliate him in this way, by setting him apart.

“…exemplary,” the major finishes, soft like a snake, and just as deadly. “Yes.”

Nines can remember FN-2188’s face, what she looks like, inside her helmet. She has lovely gray eyes, and a bright smile. Nines liked her smile a lot before she stepped forward and became a traitor.

“Yes, sir,” FN-2188 whispers.

“Report for reconditioning,” he tells her coldly. She hesitates, then snaps a salute, turns, and marches down the corridor. Nines imagines that she can feel the gaze of every other cadet through their helmets as she passes. If he were her, he’d think forgetting all this would be a gift.

“Report,” Major Distan says in the direction of FN-2187’s line.

They stand stock-still.

“Report!” He roars. “Every one of you, report, except for FN-2187.”

If they resented FN-2187 for his talent before, his cadre must hate him now, Nines thinks. At least, he would. It’s probably a good thing that they won’t remember how much they hate FN-2187.

The line salutes, turns, and begins to march past FN-2187, whose helmet is still clutched in the major’s hand. He is completely still. Nines wonders if he is even breathing at all.

“Halt, cadets,” he says.

They stop in their tracks.

“Who left the marks? Who exactly?”

FN-2186 steps forward without hesitating. “I did, sir.”

FN-2186 sleeps on the bottom half of FN-2187’s bunk. He had the guts to mark his bunkmate apart from the rest of the cadets. Nines wonders how many of the 180s are brave, and how many are not, and if they know the difference. He isn’t sure he does.

“Stay,” Major Distan commands. “Report, cadets!” The rest of the cadre salutes again, and then they are gone.

It’s just FN-2187 and FN-2186 left, alone in what used to be a line of ten. FN-2187 is still blank. He must be a _very_ good cadet, Nines realizes. Nines would probably have started trembling by now with the humiliation of having his helmet removed for so long, from the fear of what might become of him.

“Emulate FN-2187,” Major Distan announces yet again, to the entire corridor. “Dismissed, cadets.”

The lines salute as one, and begin silently reentering their bunkrooms.

It’s easy to hear Major Distan say behind them, “FN-2186, I will escort you to the decommissioning office personally. FN-2187…polish your helmet. Dismissed.”

Nines is the second-to-last in his line, and he chances a quick look back into the corridor. FN-2187 is left there, alone, holding a white helmet with marks that look like blood.

Nines wonders, much later, if this was the beginning; the beginning of when FN-2187 stood apart. The red marks, making him different from so many other troopers.

(This is not the beginning. It is just the first time the difference has been visible.)

Years pass. Nines trains hard and trains well. He is a good cadet—better than he might have been, had he not begun to emulate FN-2187, as Major Distan ordered. The major was right. FN-2187 is consistently at the top, now that Nines knows to look for him. He is first or second or third-best in all the stat charts that are released. Plenty of cadets are first in the stats at one thing.

Almost no one besides FN-2187 is in the top three at _everything,_ not in their whole year.

Nines tries not to be jealous. Jealousy does not allow him to operate at maximum efficiency.

They are inducted into the ranks of the cadets who are old enough to fight in the training rings. They are pitted against each other—no white armor and anonymous helmets for protection here, just their uniform black under-suits. Nines watches cadets he knows, cadets from his corridor and from the mess, beat each other bloody. At only eleven and twelve, most of the cadets in their year haven’t grown at the same rate. Some are big, some are small. Nines himself is tall among his peers. Sometimes the bigger cadet just keeps hitting the smaller one, until they crumple on the floor. No one ever stops them.

Nines’s bunkmate, FN-2198, lasts two rounds their first day. He goes down to a shorter, but vicious cadet from the 150s. She lasts four rounds, and then FN-2187 knocks her down and she doesn’t haul herself back up. He isn’t any bigger than her, but he’s fast, and as strong as cadets a foot taller.

FN-2187 lasts seven rounds.

A strangely tall cadet, one Nines doesn’t recognize, pretends to feint left and then delivers a heavy right hook to the side of FN-2187’s face. He goes down, rolling over hard. His cheek is bloody. FN-2187 accepts the hand the other cadet offers and joins the back of the line without complaining.

FN-2187, Nines knows, is exemplary.

Nines lasts four rounds.

When Nines is thirteen, a fire-squad of real stormtroopers visits the base: real troopers, who have been in combat. Troopers who have been on the front lines of the fight with the resistance insurgents. Almost all the stormtroopers at the training facility have been placed here since they graduated themselves; they have never seen combat.

The troopers’ designations are CO-3777, BT-2991, CO-3662, and CP-1258.

CP-1258 is the leader, despite being the youngest of her squad. She has pale, nearly blue-tinged skin and violet eyes, and a jagged silver scar across her face.

“I was de-helmeted by a rebel,” she tells the cadets in the mess, as they lean forward, fascinated. “The scum swiped me with the edge of a vibroblade, left me my scar.”

She grins. Her teeth seem strangely pointed. Nines wonders if she’s all human, like troopers are supposed to be. Alien hybrids aren’t pure enough to serve the First Order. No one else seems to notice, though, so he doesn’t say anything about it.

“I left him in the dirt,” she says.

“Blew his brains out, you did, Corp,” CO-3777 agrees. He has black hair, even darker than his deep brown skin. It’s far too long to be regulation, tied back with a cord, and his smile is blindingly white.

“Corp?” Nines’s bunkmate, FN-2198 asks, when the heavy pause makes it clear that no one else will.

“My nickname,” CP-1258 says coolly. “Every stormtrooper has one. Too hard to call full designations in combat.”

None of the stormtroopers on-site have nicknames. But then, none of them have ever really been deployed.

Nicknames. That seems…dangerous. The air is cool, fraught with sharp, careful curiosity.

“I go by Sevens, three guesses why,” CO-3777 tells them, grinning. He has freckles everywhere, just like Nines. He gestures to CO-3662. “CO-3662 is Marks, for his marksmanship, and we call BT-2991 Swipe.”

“Because he steals rations when my back is turned,” CP-125— _Corp_ laughs dryly.

“You haven’t stopped me,” BT-29—Swipe, a man remarkably muscle-strapped even for a trooper, points out.

Sevens laughs. They are all so much… _more_ , than anyone else Nines has ever met. He feels a thrill of excitement for one day, when he is a fully-fledged stormtrooper. Maybe he, too, can be more, like them.

Calling them by their nicknames, even in his head, feels dangerous, but…well, Nines never knew that troopers could have designations besides their designations. He tries to pretend for a moment that he doesn’t like the idea, but immediately gives up on that.

His designation is FN-2199. A nickname like Corp’s seems too dangerous, too close to a real name.

(Nines cannot have a real name. He wants to be more than he is, he does, but in truth, he knows he is only a cadet. He is only a cadet, who will become a stormtrooper, and stormtroopers are identical tools of the First Order, not people with names.

He might someday become _more_ , like Corp and Sevens, Marks and Swipe, smile like them, grow his hair too long, and get away with it, but even they aren’t people. They’re just troopers.

A trooper is all Nines will ever be.)

If he waits for a nickname to be given to him for a characteristic, like Marks or Swipe, he could end up with something ridiculous. This can’t go too far. But it does make sense to have something shorter than “FN-2199” for his team to use during combat.

He likes Sevens’s nickname. It’s simple.

FN-2199 could be…Nines, like CO-3777 is Sevens.

Nines is good.

This is when he begins calling himself Nines. He tells his bunkroom his choice of nickname that night, his arms crossed over his chest and his bright blue eyes confident and cold.

“Nines?” FN-2198 asks, his brow crinkled. “Why Nines? Why not something else?”

“I like how it sounds,” Nines says firmly, and Nines it is.

The rest of his cadre, too, come up with nicknames, or are given them as time passes, and they use the nicknames whenever no superiors are present.

Nines does not wonder what FN-2193’s nickname might have been if she hadn’t stolen that droid, hadn’t tried to reprogram it. Hadn’t been decommissioned. He does not wonder.

(He wonders. He thinks that if she hadn’t become _Traitor_ , she might have been _Wires_.)

Years pass. Nines trains hard and trains well. He is a good cadet.

When they turn fifteen, they are assigned to different training facilities, and sorted into their future fire-squads. They are still cadets, but now they are nearly stormtroopers, too. Nines leaves his cadre behind without a qualm, as he is supposed to, and meets FN-2000, FN-2003, and…FN-2187, who is still exemplary.

FN-2000 is the first number in their entire year. Out of a thousand cadets, 2000 to 2999, FN-2000 has the most straightforward number, and he is proud of that.

“Call me Zeroes,” FN-2000 says, his arms crossed over his chest and his brown eyes piercing.

Nines remembers his first announcement to his bunkmates. Did he look like Zeroes does now? The dark-haired cadet is confident, but still defensive.

“I go by Nines,” Nines says, running his hand through his hair. He sometimes wishes that his bright red hair and alarmingly blue eyes didn’t make him stick out so much when he is out of uniform. He has grown to rely on the helmet to hide his differences. He hides in the steadiness of their armor, loves it for the sense of unity it brings him, and for the feeling of safety he feels.

Zeroes nods. “Fine.”

“I don’t have a nickname,” FN-2187 says quietly. He sits on his new bunk, leaning forward so that he can rest his forearms on his knees. His hands are clasped calmly, and his fingers don’t twitch.

 _Huh,_ Nines thinks to himself. He wonders if FN-2187 recognizes him.

“ _I_ do,” FN-2003 adds anxiously, like they will forget about him if he doesn’t chime in. He is a little short, and has fair hair and a rounder face than most cadets, whose cheeks are usually hollowed with training and swift meals.

“Yeah, he does. We were bunked together,” Zeroes says. “Me and Slip.”

FN-2003 nods vigorously. “Yep. I’m Slip, that’s me!”

Slip isn’t much of a nickname, but Nines supposes it’s better than nothing.

“I figured you two knew each other from your designations,” he says, all dry humor. “FN-2187 and I were across the hall from each other.”

“Yeah, I think so,” FN-2187 agrees.

“That thing with your helmet the one time,” Nines starts, and then isn’t sure how to finish. “That was…did your cadre remember anything? After?”

“They guessed, maybe,” FN-2187 replies quietly. He doesn’t meet Nines’s eyes. “Because Eight-Six was…you know.”

 _Decomissioned,_ Nines thinks. “Yeah.”

Zeroes and Slip are confused, but Nines isn’t going to bother to explain.

“Well, that’s over,” Nines tells FN-2187.

 _We will emulate you, even if we do hate you,_ he thinks.

 _You made me a better cadet,_ he thinks.

“Yeah,” FN-2187 says.

After two years of using designations only in front of superior officers, “FN-2187” is a mouthful. It doesn’t matter, though, he is sure that FN-2187 will get a nickname eventually.

(He is wrong.

But FN-2187 will get a real name and his freedom along with it, so maybe he ended up with the better deal in the end.)

Years pass. Nines trains hard and trains well. He was a good cadet; now, he is a good almost-stormtrooper. FN-2187 is an exemplary almost-stormtrooper.

Zeroes is as good as Nines, and Slip is…well. Suffice to say, Nines figures out pretty quickly how he got his nickname.

Nines and Zeroes hit it off. They have a similar spirit of zealous commitment to the life. To live is to fight. Nines knows this, and so does Zeroes, and so does Slip, and so does FN-2187. Every stormtrooper does. Not to fight is to die or run, and to die or run is to betray the First Order. To betray the First Order is to be a traitor. To be a traitor is to be worse than nothing.

Nines remembers Wires-that-wasn’t and her reprogrammed droid, and FN-2188—Snitch, they called her later—who gave up the cadets who set FN-2187 apart.

They were more despicable than nothing, and Nines pities them for that, still. He can’t help it. Wires-that-wasn’t, decommissioned. Snitch, reconditioned, who forgot why she was so hated even though the hate remained.

It’s an unfortunate defect, Nines’s pity. He tries hard to stamp it out, but he never quite succeeds. He pities Slip for his lack of talent, and FN-2187 for his abundance of it. The jealousy that used to sting Nines when he thought of FN-2187’s skill has dimmed, now that he sees how it sets him apart from Zeroes and Nines himself and even Slip.

The unity of their fire-team is not complete. FN-2187 is their leader, and he does not have a nickname.

Every stormtrooper is alone, even as each stormtrooper is one with the First Order and its cause. They are each part of a faceless, well-oiled machine, and yet they are each only a grain of sand in the massive dune.

But despite the reassurance he should find in the cause they all share, FN-2187 is more alone than most, Nines knows. He does not feel Zeroes and Nines’ firm grasp on his shoulders, because he is too busy reaching away to help Slip up.

FN-2187 does this to himself. He pities more than Nines does, and handles it badly, like he handles nothing else badly. He does not just pity, he _empathizes_ , and loses his own balance trying to hold onto Slip, instead of standing firm.

Nines remembers FN-2187’s blank face in the hallway and his silence when he could have named his attackers, and remembers the blood in his white teeth as he offered a hand up to the cadets he defeated weekly in their silent, brutal fist-fights.

Major Distan was right that FN-2187 is exemplary. But his cadre was right, too: FN-2187 _is_ different.

Nines tells Zeroes this one night when they are about seventeen. They share a bunk-bed, Nines on the top and Zeroes on the bottom, in the very back of a bunkroom tucked full of junior stormtrooper fire-teams. FN-2187 and Slip share a bunk across the narrow aisle, and they are both fast asleep.

Nines is leaning over the edge, looking down at Zeroes, who is poking his head out too, even though it’s too dark to see much at all.

“FN-2187 was always strange, I think,” Nines says.

“I know,” Zeroes says. His brown eyes are as unreadable as ever in the dim light of the emergency light strip that runs along the edge of the bunkroom. “But why?”

Their voices are hushed. Zeroes and Nines very rarely stay awake past the beginning of their mandatory dormancy period, but today, FN-2187 corrected Slip’s grip on his blaster. With FN-2187’s help, the shorter trooper just barely squeaked through the door into the ‘acceptable’ category in the shooting range stats. No one noticed except for Nines and Zeroes, and they had done nothing.

“I don’t know,” Nines admits. “He just was.”

“How can he do so kriffing well and still try and throw it all away on keeping Slip’s stats up?” Zeroes wonders. “It’s like FN-2187 cares more about keeping him from being decommissioned for bad performance than about his own stats.”

Nines hesitates. He remembers the hallway incident. The marked helmet. FN-2187 and FN-2186 standing next to each other, alone. They had shared a bunkbed.

“What?” Zeroes senses that Nines is thinking.

“Just…his bunkmate was decommissioned, a long time ago,” Nines says quietly. “It was kind of his fault.”

“His fault?” Nines can feel Zeroes’s frown in the dark. “How?”

“He was good then too,” Nines explains. “Really good. Some of his cadre were jealous and made a scene this one night, smeared his helmet to make him stand out. The others didn’t stop them. They were all reconditioned, except for him and his bunkmate. FN-2186 got sent to decommissioning and FN-2187 got sent to polish his helmet.”

“Wow,” Zeroes says, after a second.

“Yeah, it was a whole…thing,” Nines agrees. “His cadre didn’t remember exactly what happened, but I think they knew it was his fault that Eight-Six was gone and he was still there.”

“Decommissioning _is_ the most efficient way to optimize performance,” Zeroes says. He sounds like he could be reciting one of the mandatory holos they watch sometimes at breakfast. Nines thinks he might be.

“Of course,” Nines agrees automatically. He does believe that. But he also believes that _FN-2187_ might prefer if defective troopers weren’t decommissioned at all.

He tells Zeroes this.

Zeroes is quiet for a long moment. “Yeah, I think you might be right. It would sort of explain why he’s so set on keeping Slip going.”

“It’s stupid, though,” Nines says, shaking his head. “Really kriffing stupid. Slip’s gonna be the first to go, and if Eight-Seven keeps trying to interfere where he shouldn’t, he’s gonna get dragged down too.”

“No kidding,” Zeroes says. “God, I can’t wait to get out there and do something. Those resistance scum are getting stronger and here we are, waiting to get off our asses and kick ’em back down where they belong.”

“Five years isn’t so long,” Nines says. “We can wait.”

He isn’t even convincing himself. Five years pass more quickly than Nines could have thought.

He trains hard and trains well, and learns to quash the malfunction of his pity. With that defect gone, his feelings toward Slip turn to disgust. For FN-2187, they turn back to quiet resentment. He forgets Snitch and Wires-that-wasn’t. Pity is useless, the kind of weakness that only resistance slime indulge in. He learns to take hits better, and welcome the taste of blood in his mouth. He is a good stormtrooper.

FN-2187 continues to help Slip up, and Slip continues taking FN-2187’s hand when it is offered. Nines and Zeroes disapprove, and the other two know it, but nothing changes. FN-2187 is the leader by default as well as stats rankings. He calls the shots.

Nines’s freckles pale and nearly disappear, his red hair still sticks up in the back, and his blue eyes still scare other troopers when he takes off his helmet in the mess. He hits his growth spurt a little late, but evens out at a height that is nearly perfect for a trooper; he has easily become more muscle-bound than lanky. Zeroes gets sliced across the face with a vibro-blade in training one day and is left a silvery-white scar across his brown cheek that distinctly reminds Nines of the stormtrooper called Corp, who told stories in the mess when they were thirteen.

Slip nearly catches up in height to the others, and his murky grayish eyes turn a sharp hazel. FN-2187 is the shortest, now, but he makes up for it with the most strength, the best reflexes, and a sharp mind.

They are nearly twenty-three when it happens.

FN-2187 forces them to go back for Slip in a training sim. Nines is sure that failure is imminent, and he wishes fiercely that FN-2187 wouldn’t involve them in his mess. Zeroes feels the same, but they follow orders, however reluctantly.

They succeed, miraculously, through FN-2187’s good leadership, but Captain Phasma does not seem pleased.

She orders FN-2187 to stay behind when they are dismissed, and Nines wonders what she is going to say to him. Will he be punished? Reconditioned, even?

FN-2187 reappears within a few minutes, no worse for wear, and Nines has to hide his surprise. It seems that nothing has changed.

(But it has.)

Their schedule becomes more grueling, always more and more and more to do, and Slip falls behind, as always. But when the moment comes where FN-2187 would normally offer Slip his help, like he had since they were fifteen and naïve, it doesn’t happen. They are in the physical training room during their usual time slot, their armor off.

Slip is running on his mandated machine, his feet sloppy and his shoulders slumped. He is not making his required speed marks.

FN-2187 glances sideways at Slip, sees the issues with his posture. His mouth narrows, and then he looks away, his eyes conflicted and hard.

And that’s it.

Every time after that, he hides his mixed frustration and resolve under his helmet—but that one moment, his face bare, tells Nines and Zeroes everything they need to know.

Phasma must have told him to stop, that day after the sim. FN-2187 has followed her orders, like the exemplary stormtrooper he is, and Slip is falling further and further behind every day.

Nines had never really realized how much of Slip’s burden FN-2187 had taken on, but now that Slip is left to carry it alone, they are being dragged further and further behind with him. They are all punished again and again for his mistakes, little things that would usually never even be noticed.

One night, their muscles aching from being used as interrogation practice for the nine and under cadets—which amounts to them being tied down and beaten bloody—as they settle into their bunks, Zeroes catches Nines’s eye.

“I’m about ready to decommission him myself,” he whispers, with a meaningful look over at Slip’s bunk.

“Me too, kriffing hell,” Nines can’t help but agree. Slip wasted five blaster shots more than their maximum during sim training, and earned two hours of “interrogation practice” for the whole fire-team. Even FN-2187’s ridiculous patience had to be near the end of its rope by now.

They fall asleep without any more discussion, too exhausted even to continue to mutter resentful things about Slip in the dark.

The next day is better; Slip doesn’t mess up badly enough for it to be noticed, and they sit down in the mess hall in the evening with gusto, trying to clean their plates before they get dismissed from the area.

“I can’t wait to get into combat,” Zeroes says, spilling numian cream everywhere.

Nines laughs despite himself, taking a moment to swallow before informing him dryly, “You’ve got numian cream all over your chin, Zeroes. Don’t let Captain Phasma see you like that!”

Zeroes wipes it off hastily, leaning forward with no small degree of excitement. “It’s coming, you can feel it. No more exercises—and actual deployment.”

This draws FN-2187’s attention, where he sits across from Nines.

“You know something we don’t?” He asks curiously. Despite his habit of staying quiet during meals, his eyes are sharp.

Zeroes nods, grinning. “I heard some of the instruction officers talking.”

Slip leans in, intrigued. “Saying what?”

“They’re accelerating our training. They say we have to be ready,” Zeroes tells them hushedly, his eyes gleaming with anticipation.

“Makes sense,” FN-2187 says, finishing up his mealbread.

Nines has to agree. No wonder it’s been so exhausting lately. It’ll be almost worth it if the end result is them getting off this rock and into combat, like Zeroes said.

“I hope it’s soon,” Slip says, a worried look in his eyes. “I really hope it’s soon.”

“Don’t hope it’s _too_ soon,” Nines points out, setting his glass down hard with a pointed look. If they go now, Slip probably won’t be ready. He’ll be the first to go. “Way you’re going, your first deployment might be your last.”

“Hey,” says FN-2187 in a tone of voice reminiscent of the days when he still helped Slip up. “He’s one of us. We’re in this together.”

Nines and Zeroes swap a look. He’s right, of course, which makes the situation all the worse.

“Yeah? Well, way he’s going, I’d rather it just be the three of us,” Zeroes says stingingly.

Slip looks hurt, and FN-2187 looks disapproving, but neither Zeroes nor Nines care; it’s the truth.

Training and their schedules overall only get worse, and Slip only follows suit. Melee combat training starts, and the hazel-eyed trooper gets the worst of it pretty fast. He goes down within one round, his head swimming with a probable concussion, much to Nines’s disgust.

Zeroes does well with his force-pike, going four rounds before FN-2187 is called up with his mace and shield. Nines knows instantly that he is going to put Zeroes on the floor, which is aggravating because if it were almost anyone else, Zeroes could certainly go longer. Sure enough, he puts up a good fight, but FN-2187 catches him in the knee and sends him sprawling.

When FN-2187 offers Zeroes a hand up, Nines can see the resemblance to the lead trooper’s former attitude towards Slip, and Zeroes will have none of it. He swats FN-2187’s hand and pity aside. He doesn’t need them, not like Slip does.

Fortuitously, it’s Nines’s turn next. His irritation at Slip, at FN-2187 and his stupid, kriffing pity, and even at Zeroes’s ungraceful defeat rises to the surface. He swings at FN-2187’s head. The match flies by in a blur, Nines only vaguely aware of his own movements. He bares his teeth under his helmet and swings hard and doesn’t wonder until later if he was actually trying to kill Eight-Seven.

Before Nines can cause any serious damage, though, FN-2187 lays him out, too. Nines lies flat on his back, completely winded, his helmet ringing from the force of the mace. When he pulls himself together enough to stagger upright, head aching, FN-2187 does not offer him a hand.

Nines moves off, back in line, but he doesn’t fight again.

After the bouts are over, FN-2187 comes to find them.

“We’re being deployed,” he says, bypassing the subject of the fights entirely.

Zeroes and Nines look at each other, eyes wide and visible with their helmets off. _This is it._

The whole business is jarring in a way Nines never would have expected. They arrive at their new barracks on Starkiller Base, full of real stormtroopers who have already seen combat.

“Fresh meat!” One of the stormtroopers, a man with a square jaw and thick eyebrows, crows. “Who’s who?”

“FN Corps,” Slip says, a dumb grin taking over his face. “Slip, Zeroes, Nines, and FN-2187.” He motions to each one of them in turn.

“Let me guess,” the square-jawed trooper says _._ “FN-2187 is in charge, right?”

“That’s right,” Zeroes says, clearly wondering how the older man knows.

“No nickname.” The trooper looks at FN-2187 peculiarly. “You’re one of those.”

“One of those what?” FN-2187 asks. Nines can practically feel the discomfort radiating off of him where he stands in between Slip and Nines.

“An outsider, cadet,” the trooper says, laughing stonily. “You’re on the outside, and you’ll always be looking in and wondering why you don’t belong.”

The stormtroopers who are paying attention laugh heartily. Zeroes joins in, and then Slip. Nines laughs, too, because this trooper has just pinned down in two minutes what Nines has spent years figuring out and ruminating on.

FN-2187 sets his helmet down on his new bed and doesn’t laugh.

Their first assignment is to perform as security detail, guarding transports on a mining colony. Nines can feel Zeroes’s and even Slip’s excitement building up with his own on the shuttle off the base and onto the freighter that takes them to the colony. FN-2187 is unreadable. Nines wonders if he even cares.

Within minutes of landing, though, it is clear that this is not the thrilling, adrenaline-filled mission they were hoping for. It is, in fact, incredibly boring guarding the transports with nothing to do.

Zeroes points this out after a while.

“No kidding,” Slip says, his voice modulated by the helmets.

Now that they are real stormtroopers, the helmet modulators are fully equipped. One of the few differences between the armor for the cadets and the troopers is the modulators, and it takes more getting used to that Nines thought it would. He keeps expecting to hear Slip’s voice, or Zeroes’s, or FN-2187’s, or even his own, and instead the overlaid buzz that covers every trooper’s voice comes out.

“Yeah, you’d think they’d send us to do something useful, kriffin’ hell,” Nines contributes. The miners were so pitiful that there was no way they’d even attempt to steal a transport. What was the point?

Then FN-2187 receives the order to report to Captain Phasma’s location. The fire-team makes their way over briskly, marching in perfect step.

They enter the room with their blaster charged, and see the miners sitting behind the negotiation table.

They exit the room only minutes later. The miners are dead behind them.

Nines’s head is buzzing. He and Zeroes had hesitated only a moment before following orders and opening fire, but Slip, surprisingly, beat them to it.

They all noticed that FN-2187 did not fire at all. Nines doesn’t understand what is happening with the dark-skinned trooper.

They stand motionless on the return freighter, and they board the shuttle back to Starkiller more sedately, previous excitement ebbed. FN-2187 is as unreadable as on the way there. Nines keeps sneaking glances to his right, somehow expecting the white helmet to betray some kind of emotion at any moment.

Is FN-2187 having cold feet? Has he finally realized that the real world isn’t the same as a training exercise or a simulation? What could be causing hesitation in a man whose iron will, bravery, and determination Nines has witnessed firsthand? Compared to standing there at ten years old, face bare in the corridor and red marks on his helmet, pulling the trigger on some meaningless miners can’t be hard at all.

 _“Outsider,”_ Nines remembers the stormtrooper in the barracks saying. A chill runs down his spine. He tightens his grip on the mesh net hanging from the ceiling and tries to look away from FN-2187’s spotless helmet.

Their training continues, now that they are real stormtroopers. Nines isn’t sure why he thought that would be different, but it isn’t.

FN-2187 is as impeccable as always; never a blaster shot amiss. However, he is pensive when he thinks no one is looking, which is almost never, and carefully blank-faced when he thinks someone might be, which is almost always. He eats in complete silence in the mess—although he never really spoke much anyway—and trains alone when he has time to himself.

Nines plays cards with Zeroes, and loses as often as he wins because Zeroes is his ~~best friend~~ closest teammate and he likes to see the light of victory in his eyes. It is good for team bonding, Nines concludes to himself, to see your teammates happy.

Nines does not try to bond with Slip. Nines does not care if FN-2187 is happy.

A few more months go by. They have more boring missions where they do nothing but guard transports or doors. They do even more boring things on Starkiller Base, like sanitation duty, which only FN-2187 doesn’t seem to mind. They get shipped over to the _Finalizer_ , and then, out of the blue and after only a couple of days, their first real deployment is announced.

In no time at all they get suited up, and then their shuttle departs the _Finalizer_ for a relatively unimportant desert planet called Jakku.

Nines is already pumped full of adrenaline. They heard while suiting up that Kylo Ren himself might be accompanying the troopers on this mission. The mission itself is to find something: a datastick, which rightfully belongs to the First Order.

The datastick is hidden in a village on Jakku’s surface. It was obtained by the insurgents through methods of espionage and trickery. Nines is cold and hot at the same time as he considers the dishonor of such an operation. Everywhere lie the dens of liars and dogs, and how they might use the precious intel on that datastick to work against the First Order makes his blood boil.

Nines exhales with determination underneath his helmet as the lights flicker in the shuttle. FN-2187’s shoulders are solid in front of him. All those who oppose the First Order, and everyone who aids and abets such despicable traitors, deserve everything that’s coming to them.

They’ll hardly even know what hit them.

Combat isn’t quite what Nines was expecting. He and Zeroes stick close together, but he sees Slip go down in only seconds or minutes—time seems strangely fast and slow at once—and FN-2187, of course, immediately pulls away to his side. All his work on ignoring Slip’s incompetency disappears in the heat of the moment.

Nines and Zeroes keep moving, more eager to avoid getting shot than they are to witness Slip’s last moments. They all saw it coming.

Nines downs three villagers himself, and Zeroes breaks off to corner a couple of runners. Nines helps his fellow troopers corral the remainder of the village into the village center, and raises his blaster, feeling the high of power as they shrink away.

FN-2187 reappears mere moments later, unharmed, as they surround the villagers, blasters trained. Nines’s heart is still in his throat, the feeling of strength from pulling a trigger for real climbing up to settle on his shoulders. This isn’t really like the mission with the miners—this is real combat, in the service of the First Order, as they try to improve the galaxy. This is real. He feels invincible, strong.

FN-2187 seems off, though, somehow. He doesn’t seem to notice Nines, who is only a couple of troopers away. His fingers are loose on his blaster. Nines notices him, though, and Nines especially notices the blood on his helmet. It must be Slip’s.

He feels momentarily unsettled, the memory of being ten suddenly fresh again in his mind. It’s funny how things happen, and the red on the helmet is so similar to the marks from back then that Nines has to blink away the memory of FN-2187 being so small, and how blank his face was, how still he stood.

FN-2187 has grown taller and broader, and maybe, Nines thinks, a little uncertain; the way he never used to be. But really, FN-2187 is fine, and Nines decides that he’s better off worrying about himself. Whatever happened with Slip, it’ll probably turn out that FN-2187 gets a medal for finally letting him die or something. A promotion, maybe. Figures. That would be just like him.

As the new prisoner, a man with dark hair and an arrogant attitude, is dragged away up the ramp of the shuttle, the troopers open fire on the villagers as ordered. Nines fires, his blaster shots precise and quick. He doesn’t remember hesitating to shoot the miners, now. He probably couldn’t imagine hesitating if he tried. And since Nines is looking at the dying faces of the villagers— _resistance trash,_ he thinks to himself angrily—he doesn’t see how FN-2187 fails to fire even a single shot.

He doesn’t see FN-2187. But if he had, everything would have made a lot more sense later.

Nines wonders in his last moments if it begins here, on Jakku, with Slip’s death and the blood on FN-2187’s helmet, setting him apart once again.

(This is not the beginning either. But the difference in FN-2187 is more than just the marks on his helmet, and now, it is visible to more than just Nines.)

Nines runs into Zeroes as they finish torching the last of the village, and they reboard the shuttle together with a firm clasp of the hands. Nines can feel Zeroes grinning, despite the plastoid armor that hides both their faces, and he knows that they share this wild joy, this feeling of freedom that comes from doing their duty, and doing it well. They don’t even notice when FN-2187 boards a completely different shuttle; they don’t register it at all until they get back to their barracks and he isn’t there. Neither is Slip, of course, because Slip is dead.

“Did he get on a different shuttle?” Nines asks, yanking off his helmet, sitting, and leaning down to unfasten his boots. “Ugh, I can just feel the sand between my toes.”

“I know, I can’t wait to have my turn in the sonic fresher. But hey, did he even make it through?” Zeroes frowns, the thin, silvery scar on his face crinkling. He unbuckles his greaves, wincing at the blood splatters that sprinkle his armor.

“Course he did, it’s Eight-Seven,” Nines points out, stacking his own pieces of armor. “No way was he gonna bite it on our first real deployment.” The bad part of combat is definitely going to be the cleaning up part afterwards—anything that doesn’t come off in the armor wash will have to be polished away by hand.

“Guess that’s true,” Zeroes agrees. “With our luck, he’s probably off getting a commendation or something.”

Nines chuckles, remembering his own thought along those lines. They finish stripping off their armor, and throw it into the chutes for washing. After taking their turns in their barrack’s fresher and getting dressed again in their black underarmor, they sink into the hard, thin pads that count as mattresses with a sigh.

Nines sits with his back against the wall and pulls out his prized deck of cards, setting up a one-man logic game. Mental challenges improve problem-solving capacity and efficiency, he knows, and he’s too bone-weary to do anything else until they are required to put their spare armor on and go to the mess hall. Zeroes just lies down on the bunk above Nines’s to catch a minute or two of sleep outside of their mandatory dormancy cycle.

Only a few minutes later, FN-2187 finally arrives, still covered in the grime of combat. He walks down the length of the bunkroom, to where their firesquad sleeps near the middle.

Nines looks over, flipping one of his cards over and greeting him casually. “FN-2187! We thought you’d been promoted or something. Lost track of you down on the ground, and then you didn’t come back to the barracks.”

“No,” FN-2187 says, pulling his helmet off as he approaches his own bed. He starts to unbuckle his armor efficiently, leaving it in a neat stack on the floor.

“What did happen?” Zeroes’ head appears over the side of his bunk.

“Captain Phasma wanted to talk to me about Slip,” FN-2187 says, not meeting either of their eyes. He tugs off his boots, and slides his stack of grimy armor into the wash chute.

“Really?” Zeroes raises an eyebrow. Nines exchanges a confused glance with him. “Why? We all knew he was gonna be the first to go. I mean, you know what his stats were.”

“I know,” FN-2187 says, casting a heavy look at Slip’s bed, which is above his own and across from Zeroes’. “She was just concerned about a replacement. The only ones suitable are from the FQ Corps.”

“Ugh.” Nines grimaces, crossing his arms over his chest. “FQ? Really?” He leans back against the wall. That’s just what they need, a completely green trooper almost four years younger than them filling in Slip’s spot. It might be just as bad as if Slip hadn’t finally bit it.

“Which is why she wanted a word,” FN-2187 explains, taking a seat on his bunk. He reaches for his vac-wipe and starts scrubbing the dried blood off his helmet, which he hadn’t abandoned to the wash with the rest of his armor.

“We all know you’re gonna be first up into a command position, Eight-Seven,” Nines says, feeling his usual resentment give way to an odd sort of fondness now that he knows there will be no special rewards today.

Since Slip is gone, if the new trooper pulls their weight like everyone else, things might be way better. There’s even a chance that maybe FN-2187 will learn to fit in with Nines and Zeroes a little more without needing to worry about Slip. 

“Yeah,” Zeroes agrees. “Phasma having a word with you over something as little as that? You’re on your way up.” Nines can hear the envy in Zeroes’ voice, and he gives his teammate a wry look that he knows he can’t see from the top bunk before going back to his logic exercise. 

“On my way up,” FN-2187 repeats quietly. “Sure.” His face is unreadable. He rubs his thumb over the front of the helmet, dabs the vac-wipe at the last remaining smears.

“How long do you think it’s gonna take Slip’s replacement to get their ass kicked by FJ-2999?” Zeroes asks Nines, hanging his head over the edge of the bunk so that they can see each other.

Nines snorts, flipping another card. “Not long, that’s for sure. Remember, your big mouth got your ass handed to you our first night here? It’s only been what—four, five days since then? Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten already.”

“Hey, shut up, she’s the oldest one here, and definitely the most experienced, and you know it,” Zeroes huffs. “How was I supposed to know she’d get offended when I said she was an old-timer?”

Nines rolls his eyes. “I don’t know why you thought she wouldn’t. Point being, a younger trooper has even less chance than you of walking away without a fight if they say something stupid.”

“I need to go do some sim work,” FN-2187 interrupts, standing and yanking open his spare armor drawer. He starts buckling the pieces on at full speed.

“What, really?” Nines asks, startled. It isn’t at all unusual for FN-2187 to go off to train in their off-hours, but even for him, the timing here seems odd. “After all that action, planet-side?”

“I felt rusty on my maneuvers,” he says, reaching for his boots again. “I need a brush-up. Want to come?”

Nines and Zeroes exchange a look. Is he crazy? They’re tired and he should be too.

“Uh, no. Sorry, FN-2187,” Zeroes tells him, skeptical. “We’re off to the mess in an hour or so.”

“Well, I’ll…” FN-2187 gives them a strange, considering look. “I’ll just be going, then.” He doesn’t bother getting out his spare helmet, just takes the freshly cleaned one and pulls it back on, turning to go.

“Bye,” Nines shrugs. He goes back to his cards, and makes another play against himself, brow furrowed. “Anyway, bet you my next early fresher turn that the replacement’s on their ass in a day or less.”

“I don’t wanna take that bet,” Zeroes complains.

“Take it or leave it,” Nines says, a rumble in his stomach as he thinks about dinner. He glances up at the barracks door, and catches just a glimpse of FN-2187’s back, disappearing around the doorframe.

He goes back to the game.

(This small passing moment, anticlimactic though it may be, is an end of sorts, and Nines doesn’t even know it—although FN-2187 does.)

The next time that Nines sees FN-2187, it’s on the holo that they broadcast all over the _Finalizer_. If it’s here, it’s all across the First Order, on every base and ship, Nines knows.

His mouth is dry and the pit of his stomach is hollow. He stares at the tiny blue hologram, which appears from the shoulders up. It’s the standard image identification holo that they have to take once a year, just to update the system. This one was taken just shortly before the mission with the miners, not so many months ago at all.

He's wearing his black shirt, of course, and his face is calm and still. His jawline is as firm as ever, and there is no hint of conflict in his eyes. The holo does not identify him as a stormtrooper, only as _A rebel insurgent who freed a prisoner and blasted his way off the_ Finalizer _. Capture by any means necessary, and if all else fails, kill on sight._

Zeroes peers over Nines’ shoulder solemnly. No one really knows his face except for them; they’re new to the _Finalizer_ , and even if someone in their barracks did recognize him, there would be no way to be sure. Those who have noticed his absence must have assumed he was lost on Jakku along with Slip. Troopers die every day, and no one cares.

Nines can feel his face going hot with anger like he has never felt before. “I can’t believe this,” he whispers, low and quiet. “I can’t _believe_ —”

“Hey, hey,” Zeroes matches his tone, low and furtive. “Me either, okay, but…but maybe there’s some kind of mistake, I mean—”

“No,” Nines says, betrayal building up in the pit of his chest. He has always felt a fervor for the cause, but this…this is a closer rage. This is personal. He and FN-2187 have known each other since they were too young to remember anything at all. “This is the First Order. There _are_ no mistakes. Not with this. He left yesterday and he didn’t come back, and it was because he freed that Resistance scum and shot at those troopers in the docking bay, and he stole a TIE fighter and he isn’t coming back.”

Zeroes is silent for a moment, staring down at the tiny holo in Nines’ palm. He sighs. “Yeah.”

Nines shakes his head, unable to say anything else, his throat tight. No one even knows that this is one of their brothers. None of the stormtroopers around them know that just yesterday, the face on this holo was obscured by a white plastoid bucket just like theirs.

And yet FN-2187 threw everything away. He threw away his life, he threw away Nines and Zeroes and everything that came with them. He threw away the mission of the First Order, and any honor he had. He chose, wildly and unbelievably, to free the very trash of the galaxy the First Order was trying to eradicate, to murder his fellow troopers in a wild attempt to flee the _Finalizer_ , and to betray everything he ever stood for and everything they knew.

FN-2187 is a traitor. He is worse than _nothing_.

And how had it happened, right in front of Nines’ nose? In front of Zeroes’?

When had he started to betray them? When Slip died? On the shuttle to Jakku? When he refused to fire his blaster at those miners? In training, when he beat their scores and constantly helped Slip up? When he had failed to fit in so much that he never even gained a nickname for his own? When he was ten and his whole cadre was reconditioned because of him, when his bunkmate was decommissioned?

When had it started? When was the beginning of his deception?

“He’s a _traitor_ ,” Nines says finally, his anger burning past the knots in his throat. “I hope we capture him ourselves. I want to see his face when I kill him.”

“Me too, Nines.” Zeroes reaches out and turns off the holo, and gently pries it out of Nines’ stiff, white-knuckled fingers. He’s hurt, bitter, but his anger will fester slowly, not like Nines’ potent rage.

Nines lets him take it, and pulls his helmet back on, jaw tight. FN-2187 is a traitor, and they have an assignment to do.

They complete their assignments for the next several days, and pretend that they don’t know the man in the holos, and Nines itches to get off-base and pursue their former teammate. But the First Order knows the best course of action, and although they want to go after him, because they are loyal, they do what they are ordered.

He was, of course, lying to them about Slip’s replacement, and the real replacements—two, now—are a pair of older troopers who roll in the day after the holo goes around. Their designations are FM-4690, nicknamed Stripe, and FM-1176, nicknamed Drains. Stripe is a good shot with a sharp grin, and she’s known Drains, who’s heavy on endurance and light on brains, for a while. Where she is slight and small for a trooper, he’s tall and brawny. They’re good company, and they make a good team, so things could be worse.

Nines still catches himself looking for FN-2187 to give orders instead of Stripe, and Zeroes watches Nines with a worried air, as if Nines can’t feel his gaze through the helmets.

Then comes Takodana.

They get their deployment orders, and in the hustle of all the troopers rushing to their assigned shuttles, Nines is blazing with anticipation. This time, the target is a droid, an orange and white BB unit with the same datastick from their deployment on Jakku.

A number of troopers on every shuttle are issued vibroaxes this time, and Nines has always been especially good with one, so he and Drains take the two their fire-team is assigned. The flight down isn’t long, and Nines stares at Stripe’s shoulders in front of him, remembering how it was FN-2187 standing there only a few days before.

He can feel Zeroes’ grounding presence behind him, and he grins, short and bitter. It’s time to fight.

This time, he doesn’t feel the joy of combat, but he still feels the power, and the freedom, and the strength. His shooting is accurate and deadly, his blaster in one hand and his shield in the other. The vibroaxe rests at his hip, waiting for when he needs it. Zeroes sticks close, and they advance forward through the blaster fire and the missiles from the TIE fighters.

The tension in the air is thick, and the screams in the air fill his ears like they haven’t ever before. Nines hears more than sees Drains and Stripes go down in a single blast. Zeroes and Nines keep moving.

The rage that fuels Nines’ adrenaline isn’t even close to burning out. Zeroes moves ahead of him quickly, aiming to kill, and topples two or three opponents without issue. A yell from Nines’ left startles him, and he turns to deliver a kill shot to a woman’s chest. His aim is perfect, and he's only turned away for a moment, but that moment is enough.

Nines turns back, and a hand clenches tight around his lungs. Zeroes— _oh,_ kriff _no, Zeroes_ —is falling to the ground, a sizzling hole in his chest. And standing over him, holding a blue lightsaber, is FN-2187.

Time seems to freeze as Zeroes hits the ground. The deserter is wearing only his black under-armor and a battered leather jacket, no hint of the white stormtrooper armor in sight.

Nines can feel the bubble of fury in his chest break and consume him at the sight of his former teammate, devoid of the only thing that ever made him valuable. He stands there, Zeroes dead at his feet, holding a lightsaber like Kylo Ren. A _lightsaber_ , as if he’s important, when all he is…is nothing.

“ _Traitor!_ ” Nines roars, and he discards his blaster and shield. He equips his vibroaxe, swinging it around to the ready position, thrumming with energy.

FN-2187 has the gall to squint at him, as if he recognizes his voice, but isn’t sure, and Nines can hardly breathe as he strides forward. Zeroes is dead. Zeroes is _dead_.

FN-2187, the traitor, killed him.

As they fight, axe clashing with lightsaber, Nines wonders when things went this wrong. How did this begin, that FN-2199 must kill FN-2187, when years ago, they lived in bunkrooms just down the hall from each other?

He presses forward, and remembers all the times they fought, all the times they shared a roll of the eyes at Zeroes’ jokes, remembers pitying and resenting FN-2187 in turns, and remembers, too, how once upon a time, standing in a corridor, they were equally straight-backed and unremarkable.

That has changed, Nines thinks, as he raises the axe to bring it down across his former brother’s neck. FN-2187 will never be unremarkable again.

+++

Finn stumbles to his feet, clasping Han Solo’s hand.

“You okay, Big Deal?” Han gives him almost a half-smile, able to amuse himself even in a crisis.

“Thanks,” says Finn, and doesn’t look behind him at the corpse he knows is Nines. He wasn’t sure at first, until Nines rushed at him, and then he knew.

It’s Nines on the ground, who Han shot, who Finn slept five feet away from until only a few days ago. And chances are, if that is Nines, the trooper Finn just killed is Zeroes.

Nines and Zeroes, gone just like that, after all these years. Finn mourns for just an instant, for them and for Slip. And then they are surrounded by troopers, and the moment for him to mourn them is gone.

Finn is new to this whole thing about doing what his gut tells him is the right thing, instead of what the First Order tells him is the right thing. At the same time, though, the confusion he’s fighting is old hat. He’s known that conflict for a long time, even when he didn’t know what it was. To be honest, he doesn’t know when it started blooming in him; when the difference was made in him that let him start to see through the haze of lies the Order fed everyone.

What caused it, he isn’t sure, but…well.

Maybe it was just a feeling.

The truth is that he isn’t sure there’s a real beginning to his being different. Maybe there is, and he just doesn’t know it, but maybe there isn’t.

But Finn doesn’t think it really matters when it started. Maybe it just matters that it started at all.

He doesn’t know where Rey is, BB-8 could be anywhere by now, and as an X-wing with a spectacular pilot loops through the sky above him, he could swear he can feel a familiar grin.

And Nines and Zeroes and Slip…they’re gone.

Finn will mourn later, for what could have been—what should have been, in a better world. Until then, he has a new name, new friends, and a new purpose.

There’s work to do.


End file.
